Several commenters have objected to my connecting Margaret Sanger’s radio program with the larger feminist movement. Bluedog has a long and complicated explanation involving class which is specific to the one woman Sanger ostensibly was talking to. New commenter openidname struggles with the math but comes to much the same conclusion:

Hmmm. One dumb-ass woman says one dumb-ass thing 650 FREAKING YEARS ago.
Get over it already.

Another new commenter by the handle Ann first explained that she was molested as a child and had an abusive porn viewing husband, before explaining that in exposing the ugliness of feminists like Sanger I am hurting women:

Groups do not abuse, individuals abuse. Sometimes, evil people, women like Sanger or men like Manson collect evil people and attract victims. Unfortunately, some are successful.

When evil people, like Sanger, get individual men to paint in this case, “all women” as evil, they win. When you hate women because of Sanger and her followers, you feel OK hurting women (since they are all evil). You have then become the thing you hate. Sadly, you hurt women, who may then become more attracted to Sanger and her ilk.

The simple truth is that Sanger was a radical feminist. In 1914 she began publishing the radical feminist monthly Woman Rebel. She was well connected within the progressive movement, including Eleanor Roosevelt.

Moreover, the ideas she was selling in the radio program are the same ideas modern feminism is founded on, the same ideas which are now mainstream even for conservatives. Sanger founded Planned Parenthood, but the text of the program could have easily been written by the founder of NOW, Betty Friedan. Friedan is credited with kicking off modern feminism with her book The Feminine Mystique. Here is the synopsis of that book from Wikipedia:

The Feminine Mystique begins with an introduction describing what Friedan called “the problem that has no name”—the widespread unhappiness of women in the 1950s and early 1960s. It discusses the lives of several housewives from around the United States who were unhappy despite living in material comfort and being married with children.

What bothers these commenters is feminism is undeniably ugly, and I’m laying that out bare for all to see.

The myth is that modern feminism suddenly kicked off with Friedan’s book raising women’s consciousness of the oppression of marriage and motherhood. The truth is that feminists had been beating the drums of envy and petty unhappiness for many decades, with perhaps a slight reduction in volume during the depression and World War II. But whether you trace the roots back to Friedan, Sanger, or even further, you will find the same ugly philosophy of envy, miserliness, and petty unhappiness.

Feminism can’t shed that ugly legacy because this is what feminism is all about. This is why even after radically reworking our entire society we still have feminist leaders like Hillary Clinton explaining that “Women have always been the primary victims of war. Women lose their husbands, their fathers, their sons in combat.” It is also why we will always have women eyeing the military with envy.

Edit: Corrected the title of Sanger’s feminist monthly from The Women Rebel to Woman Rebel.

115 Responses to The woman rebel.

As I said in my last comment, keep overturning those rocks Dalrock. This ugliness needs to be exposed to the light, because that is the only way it can be confronted. Comments like the ones you’ve mentioned show the truth of the old adage: You know you’re near the target when you start receiving flak.

“When evil people, like Sanger, get individual men to paint in this case, “all women” as evil, they win. When you hate women because of Sanger and her followers, you feel OK hurting women (since they are all evil)”

Apparently it’s not just feminists but also some traditionalists who believe such paranoid nonsense. Here’s a quote from our old pal Alte from 2010 about MRAs:

“They wish to alienate men from women so that the men will later not be unnerved by the abuse and neglect of said women.”

What bothers these commenters is feminism is undeniably ugly, and I’m laying that out bare for all to see.

Yep. This particular bit of truth will especially offend tradcons, who want to push a limited version of feminism that includes all the go-girl stuff but stops short of being pro-abortion. That way they can be pro-life and pro-(delayed)-marriage while still sending their daughters off to college and fabulous careers and encouraging them to dominate their husbands. Pointing out that Margaret Sanger — a eugenicist who was chummy with the KKK and founded Planned Parenthood to keep down the numbers of inferior humans — is part of their heritage, is just Not Nice!

I think the conspiracy show hosts like Alex Jones, Jesse Ventura (Navy Seal, Wrestler, Governor, Actor), David Eicke, and the others think this division and alienation between males and females is a New World Order, Luciferian plot to lower birth rates, decrease population without the actual use of wars, plagues, health decline measures, or just bluntly kill off the masses of people by brute force?

The truth is that feminists had been beating the drums of envy and petty unhappiness for many decades, with perhaps a slight reduction in volume during the depression and World War II. But whether you trace the roots back to Friedan, Sanger, or even further, you will find the same ugly philosophy of envy, miserliness, and petty unhappiness.

Yep!

And you can find several writings from the 1800s filled with this ugly philosophy disguised as crusades against misogyny. What I don’t get is why would these evil oppressive men give these poor, destitute, and oppressed women their freedom in the 1st place?

I mean even slavery in the US required a substantial amount of blood to be shed before it ended. Why were there laws that existed to protect women from men, but not the other way around? Why weren’t all women out digging ditches and picking cotton back in the mean ole patriarchy days? Why weren’t these horribly oppressed women plowing the fields or dying in the wars? I know, I know… because of patriarchy… oh wait…

” It discusses the lives of several housewives from around the United States who were unhappy despite living in material comfort and being married with children”.

i.e neurotic or psychotic women.

Few ask are women happier now with the hookup culture.

I also don’t like the term MRA. Men and women don’t have different rights. Note how feminists were first advocating the rule of law, not privilege, then degenerated. “MRAs” are advocating rule of law – the law should apply blindly and equally to all. Perhaps “RoLAs” would be a better term.

It’s worth mentioning that at the Nuremberg trials many of the accused invoked Sanger and her teachings as part of their defense. Essentially they claimed that America had espoused the same ideology of racial purity (through Sanger) that Germany had instituted. Perhaps we should put feminism denial in the same category as Holocaust denial.

Just a couple of days ago, I found an article describing a ‘commitment ceremony’ for the bull of a cuck couple. The ceremony included readings from Emma Goldman. When my dad was a boy he delivered Emma Goldman’s newspapers in Toronto. My grandpa also had an opinion of Emma Goldman, “Free love? A woman who looks like that would have to pay, and dearly”. Grandpa was kind of earthy.

The article makes the claim that Goldman had an early influence on Sanger, but they had a falling out. The article does not mention that part of the falling out, was because Sanger was an open admirer of the Nazi eugenics program, and that she regarded Jews and Negroes as the main sources of ‘racial pollution’ in America. Not that Goldman seemed sympathetic to black Americans.

I also found an anti-Semitic web site that linked to above web page.

This Jewish themed web page, in it’s focus for birth control and ‘women’s rights’ overlooks the racist, anti-Semitic aspects of its chosen cause.

I would like to hear the opinions of others, is this lack of awareness of consequences a women thing, a Jewish thing, or a Jewish women’s thing? I have no wish to hear from the Jew haters, as the Covenant between God the Father and descendants of Abraham still exists, even if we gentiles cannot understand the role it plays in future history.

“I mean even slavery in the US required a substantial amount of blood to be shed before it ended.”

Not really. It did take that, but the war was part of preventing southern independence, not freeing the slaves. Lincoln would have kept slavery (per his own writings) if it would have kept the union together. The Emancipation Proclamation only freed slaves in rebel territories, not those still in the union.

It was a financial issue at its core, as are many such things. Slavery was abolished without bloodshed in many other places already.

It kind of seems like the modern problem of divorce rape many men face. A more powerful force requires them to effectively stay in a union (without the benefits of course). The south ultimately had to continue to pay for the north’s wealth. That theme could certainly be explored more and doing that would like offend many people.

The actual phrase in her comment was “sexually abusive husband who wasted decades in porn”. What is exactly is a sexually abusive husband? He wanted to have a lot of sex? Wanted to do kinky things? Was it the porn viewing itself that she feels constituted “sexual abuse”. Was he forcing her to engage in sex? If so, why did he have to force her? I get that a father can be sexually abusive, but I’m not clear what would constitute sexual abuse by a husband. If he was beating her and forcibly sodomizing her that would be abuse, but that’s really just a form of physical abuse.

I’m no historian and I agree with your assessment on why the war was started, yet it still took blood shed for the ball to get rolling and for slavery to end. I know many will argue that it would have come any how, but the US wasn’t like other places and in some ways still isn’t.

My point, however poorly stated, is that women in this country were in no way ever oppressed (like US slaves were), yet feminists scream “oppression” when pointing to the past.

Oh dear; I have just sighted the first instance on this thread of Godwin’s Law. Personally I have never come across this porn thing on the internet but I must say those pictures of the Colombian Ladies Cycling team in their new kit are enough to make me an abusive cycling watcher.

Hmmm… Let me throw out a few things at you from recently, and longer ago… ISIS – as a group they are abusive, Nazi’s, Gengis Khan’s army… I think I’ve made my point… So Sanger is your typical liberal moron spouting non-sense, which always withers when exposed to the truth. There are some “groups” that the best thing to do is to hunt them down and kill them without mercy. I would pretty much put anyone that follows Islam – the religion of hate – in that group. But that’s me… I was never politically correct in anything – mostly because I observe reality and respond accordingly.

One of the things that I consider profitable from reading in the manosphere is that I often have my eyes opened to attitudes I carry that are the spawn of feminism. I despise Margaret Sanger and all that she stood for and the terrible legacy she has left with us, and yet when I read stories about wives during WWII being envious of their husbands’ world travels I am reminded of the days when I have pitied my poor, poor self for being stuck in the house while my husband got to spend all day in engaging conversations with co-workers. What an idiot I can be! Concern trolls be damned.

Based on what we have seen. Now imagine the men that have gone to war now and what their loving wives have for them. Off the chart suicide rate. Every day stars and stripes armed forces television/radio every other public service announcement is a reminder that all males are racist, sexist homophobic wife beaters that molest there kids or are dead beat dads. And if it were not for sexist privilege you wouldn’t have a job or rank. This was my actual experience deployed to Japan as a Marine in the early 90’s minus the homophobia charge.

Feminism was first a Nazi and then a blatantly communist ideology. The power of the herd was then captured for the international communist conspiracy to attack and undermine the fundamental institutions of bourgeois society. The Family would have to go and that is what they set about accomplishing. Sadly, it is a historical fact that Conservative icon Ronald Reagan really got the ball rolling with no-fault divorce which became the cause-de-rigor of family law in the early 70’s.

At the same time they gave individual women complete power to self destruct their marriages they also set about giving them cash and prizes for doing so. Family courts adopted an almost universal polity of custody presumed to be with the mother. Very few exceptions. All female panels or at least feminist overlords stood over the committees while they decided child support formulas to be enforced against the non-custodial parent.

At the same time they attacked the schools and replaced almost all male elementary teachers with feminist inspired you…go…girrrrlllls who were encouraged to punish normal boy behaviors and recommend drugs for them. Even today they set up pantheons to the all powerful vagina-girl. My 8 y/o son’s classroom was practically a feminist Mecca- full sized girl posters of obscure artists and scientist that NOBODY had ever heard of all surrounded with bright pink and yellow doily’s. Not a single male scientists, adventurer or political leader was on the walls of her classroom. I can barely imagine how out of place my son feels every morning when he walks into that room- as intended.

What is happening was not an accident. The shit we have today was planned from the very beginning- you have to crack a few eggs to make an omelet, right? The women are rebelling exactly on cue Dalrock. They are scurrying like cockroaches under a light.

I have been following this posting thread with great interest. It fascinates me how people of different faith/ideologue/philosophy bents will hide their philosophy’s warts (oh that was “old” thinking we don’t think that way anymore). AND then say with a straight face that all of the prohibitions in Pentateuch means that Christianity has no validity.

Feminism at its core is a belief system with it’s gospels like “The Feminine Mystique”. All of this belief system should be held up to the harsh light of rational inspection… not just the good parts that every media type would say is on the right side of history.

Marriage Counseling has been explained to me (by 5 friends) as a very uncomfortable experience. The man literally checks his gonads at the door while two women get explain that all the wrongs, real or imagined, are his fault. And the only “counseling work” the wife has to perform is to “compromise” when hubby does not provide EXACTLY what the wife wants in life. Apparently a great deal of time is spent getting the wife to accept the limits of the husbands largess and to be satisfied with that. Also there is the bonus of the man being told that if he does extra work (aka choreplay) will somehow close the gap and get the wife to stay married to a lesser man’s means (you know a Chevy Mini-van vs Lexus SUV compromise).

What’s fascinating about your exploration of the beginnings of marriage counseling is that it WAS ALWAYS meant to be about fixing the man. Your story of the wife at home sad about rearing a child while her husband is FIGHTING TYRANNY is so in line with what I’ve heard. NO counselor apparently tells the wife “she should lump it… he’s the best you are EVER going to get”. Although come to think of it one friend DID say that his counselor made a pass on him after he stormed out of a session saying “I’m leaving here and I’m getting a divorce”.

I put my confidence in reality and nature. Since women chose to rail against “the problem that has no name” by attacking in every way possible the men who built the civilization they have Dr. Reality will step in with his bestie Mother Nature and bring back problems that have very concrete names.

The reason these stupid bitches had the space to complain about boredom (which is the problem they were moaning about) is because generations of men fought, worked, and died making sure real problems didn’t affect them. So now that they’ve gotten everything they said they wanted lets see how they deal with things like poverty, disease, violence, war, famine, exposure, and death. That’s what’s you get when you destroy the society you are living in, the one that protected you from all of the above because you were bored.

Of course the current generations of men won’t care if they see an ugly, fat, feminist starving and stamping her feet because her EBT card isn’t working. Let her die! Equality in all things remember? Even death. Enjoy the golden future you cunts.

I for one am appalled at the “Get over it, already!” childish response of your commentator. Is this one woman’s response, or is it typical?
Women very frequently employ terms like this, plus shaming terms (“Are you retarded?!” ) when they are in positions of power or when they are losing arguments. They are incapable of rational discussion.
As for feminism being ugly, No Ma’am has a gallery of feminist quotes:

The stand-outs are Mary Daly, Jilly Cooper, Andrea Dworkin, Simone de Bouvier, Betty Friedan, Valerie Solanas, Josef Stalin and Elizabeth Stanton. Think I’ being extremist by adding Stalin to the list? not at all. Read the writings of these genocidal harpies yourself and then decide, a thing “feminist” women never do.

It did take a lot of blood to end the war and ending slavery (at least in one form) was a result, but the fact it was not the cause means you cannot say that ending slavery caused a lot of bloodshed. The desire to prevent peaceful succession required a lot of blood.

I have been listening to a lot on this topic lately (see the Mises Institute) which is why it jumped out at me more. It is one of the modern myths we have.

Brad – Again I’m not a historian, but even a quick google search tells me that there are differing opinions on this subject. As I understand it, slavery was the central source of escalating political tension in the 1850s. Also, I’ve read that the Republican Party was determined to prevent any spread of slavery, and many Southern leaders had threatened secession if Lincoln won the 1860 election.

It should be pointed out that Ann herself is a Sanger-like character who is acceptable in “polite society”. She publicly made a wildly insane and wholly evil threat; yet her tone makes obvious that she believes it was only a sensible response.

When evil people, like Sanger, get individual men to paint in this case, “all women” as evil, they win. When you hate women because of Sanger and her followers, you feel OK hurting women (since they are all evil). You have then become the thing you hate. Sadly, you hurt women, who may then become more attracted to Sanger and her ilk.

Translation: If I or another woman mischaracterizes your statements of historical facts–and that mischaracterization misleads one of us to feel that you hate women or that other men will be encouraged to hate women–then we will support the extermination of Blacks and Jews.

Hello fellow Canuck.As a Jew who lives in Toronto I might be able to help with your questions.

“”Sanger was an open admirer of the Nazi eugenics program, and that she regarded Jews and Negroes as the main sources of ‘racial pollution’ in America.””

Yes she was.I read a book about her and she had no admiration for Blacks or Jews.

“”I would like to hear the opinions of others, is this lack of awareness of consequences a women thing, a Jewish thing, or a Jewish women’s thing?””

I would say a Jewish wimminz thing.Jewish women are VERY controlling.You will also find that 99.9% of these Jew broads that are on the bandwagon for women’s right and birth control are also “Atheistic Jews”.I have warned on many past threads to the men that post here…”Stay Away From Jewish Women”.I would never get involved with a Jewish woman.Jewish women are all about “Money & Power”,nothing else.Now,I am also about Money & Power.But,I am a man,it is different for me,that is my calling.A Jewish woman will never sit at home and be a housewife.I know one….my baby sister.But,she has slowly turned the tide for herself as she has seen these atheistic Jew women and the way that they go about everyday life and the damage they have done.For example,ever notice that the majority of abortion clinics are Jewish owned? Remember Henry Morgentaler in Toronto? I know a few abortion doctors.Their Jewish wives hold their heads high in pride and arrogance as to what their husbands do.To me they are nothing but fucking murderers.In fact,they are worse than murderers.Killing a person outright is one thing,killing a defenseless life in the womb is about the lowest thing that I can imagine.At the Synagogue that I attend we do let those people through the front doors.Back in the 80’s we went through this.The doctors would “tithe” money to the Synagogue.The Rabbi said..”No way are we accepting money like that”…and he was correct.

“”the Covenant between God the Father and descendants of Abraham still exists””

As I get further into the red pill, I have come to the conclusion that women are more spiritual. The love prayer and communication with God and the feeling that God loves them too, because they are being good. Men do religion to know what is true, what is false, what is good, what is evil, and how now should I live.

Women guard the spiritual, and men guard the sacred. Current pastoral care of marriage within the Catholic church is very fem-centric, and no woman ever does anything wrong! It can really suck to be a Catholic husband and father. The only reason to continue is because I believe the Faith to be true.

As an aside, I have some Muslim co-workers with the same complaints of their women and the mosque that you and I have. A quote from a Muslim husband, “The imam says, ‘You have to do this … to make me happy!’ “.

Mark’s advice comes a bit late (though I appreciate it nevertheless), for I had a Jewish Girlfriend – probably one of his rejects – but she was not an atheist even though she worked for Planned Parenthood – so it is a pity that she did not apply its principles to her growing collection of felines. She had a hot-line to god so she said and when I probed further, clammed up, explaining it was a very private matter which clearly even she did not fully comprehend.

Always trying to feed me Matzo-ball soup. It was she who unwittingly taught me that no matter how many degrees in hard sciences a woman has or how reasonable a woman may otherwise appear she is likely to break-down in hysterics at the slightest perceived injury with floods of tears and copious sulks.

I think what she really wanted was a nice Jewish boy, but it seems that no Jewish man wanted her – or perhaps she was impatient, given her liking for racially challenged males – though for a while thought that a stiff-upper-lip Anglo-Saxon was more to her taste.

I noticed on the dating sites that women use the word spiritual when describing their beliefs! That is a copout and is saying they have no true belief in God! I think the majority of women today are self-centered and have no true relationship with God! Divorce is rampant with women causing 75% of all divorces! They have lost all heart and many a good men are suffering for it! In the end though men will come out on top because when women get older men want nothing to do with them!!!!!!

I’ll just add my voice to those that are encouraging you to keep posting. Very few writers like you out there and despite the lowbrow dimwits set on an irrational smear campaign, there are way more men interested in what you have to say than are not.

“Why weren’t all women out digging ditches and picking cotton back in the mean ole patriarchy days? Why weren’t these horribly oppressed women plowing the fields or dying in the wars? I know, I know… because of patriarchy… oh wait…”

You’ll need to make some class and race distinctions here. Women who were considered in the lower socioeconomic class and women of color worked alongside men in the fields. Feminism began as a white, middle class/upper class women’s movement. They historically rejected women of color (such as Anna Julia Cooper, Sojourner Truth, etc.).

Regarding the slavery discussion: I think there needs to be a distinction made between the institution of slavery and the ideology that perpetuated it. That may help with parsing out the history.

You are cetainly right about Sanger. The roots of feminism are deeper still. Feminism as an open doctrine that advocates for changes to/rasing the status of women traces to the late 18th Century (de Gouge, Wollstonecraft, C. Macaulay, Masham and some others). The hidden roots are much deeper still.

If anyone is interested, I made a guest post at J4G over the summer about Lincoln and the war. It’s hashed out in great detail. No point in repeating all the arguments, unless someone is particularly interested and D does not object.

As an aside, I have some Muslim co-workers with the same complaints of their women and the mosque that you and I have. A quote from a Muslim husband, “The imam says, ‘You have to do this … to make me happy!’

I posted about this a long time ago, someplace. It probably bears repeating. I’ve dated a couple of Muslim chicks over the course of the last couple of years, been to the local masjid, and know some of the families.

North American Islam is undergoing the feminization process. There are outward and inward signs of this. If you go to your local Islamic centre, and compare the women’s prayer room to the men’s, you’ll notice the better upkeep, nicer furnishings, fancier carpet and fresher paint that the wimminz enjoy. Likewise, if you listen to the preacher on Friday afternoon, there is a good chance that he will give the sort of beta blue-pill speech that is ubiquitous in Protestant services. He may sprinkle fawning comments about the blessed sisters who do so much for the congregation, or he may devote an entire sermon to the duties and responsibilities of the Muslim man to bust his ass so that princess doesn’t have to scratch a nail, to fund all sorts of extravagant female wishes, and otherwise to make his Muslim wife haaaappppy.

The standards of Muslim families are a bit higher than the norm, at least in North America; but, this also appears to be changing. I know an early 20something Muslimah who has already frivorced one man, who wears hijab as though to contrast ample cleavage and yoga pants, and who curses more skillfully than I. She is still the exception, but sluts like her are the vanguard of the cultural decline, and I’m sure that she represents the future of Islam, which is has the potential for exactly the same depravity as Protestants, Jews, Catholics and Mormons.

Ran across this article and though I’d leave it here. The title is rather misleading since they reference the Duggar Family and use Michelle’s picture. But it is more or less about a woman who left the quiverful movement siting “abuse.”

I have said things are different in Mexico, even though the human drama tends to be the same. That is, people pull the same stunts, but society reacts differently.

A woman in our church told us yesterday that she had been arrested and detained for a couple hours. I assume charges are filed, and there will be some sort of legal action against her.

Some time ago, her parents separated. Here in rural Mexico that usually involves male adultery. (That sounds strange for a 35+ year MRA to say, but it is true. A majority of men I know admit having affairs.) The mother was pretty angry with the father.

He is in his last days. For seven months, he has needed close care and could die at any time. His three daughters have taken care of him, sort of tag team style. In this culture, yeah, maybe he did the naughty, but he is their dad and he is old.

The mother told them to stop taking care of him. She wants him to die alone, “like a dog.”

They kept on. He is old and he is dying and he is their dad. And, this is Mexico, not the USA. And, as I have written, the herd does not dominate as in the USA.

So, Mommy went to the prosecutor and said those three daughters had attacked her and beat the crap out of her. So, the cops went out and attempted to arrest the three sisters for DV. One of them made herself scarce. The other two did not…

The doctor who examined the mother said, “The evidence does not support the charge.” But, apparently they must still go through court proceedings. And, I am guessing she fears going to prison, a normal fear of anyone facing court action even on false charges. I sure would!

I find this a different scenario than the normal thing in the USA. The vile, evil bitch willing to destroy her own children to destroy the man she hates is the same. The biggest difference, though, even with the father’s probable misconduct, his daughters did not abandon him.

And, I would say the mother’s very apt description of a man dying alone, “like a dog” is too often the fate of divorced men in the USA.

One might wonder what will happen to the mother when she also gets old and needs daily care. My best guess is in spite of her evil, the daughters will take care of her when she needs it. That is Mexico.

It’s because of the overall culture. That is dominant and influences everything. The only groups who are effective at keeping that at bay are the ones who work hard at being devotedly separatist — e.g., the Amish, the Chasidim, etc. Most American muslims live in a way that is in many ways integrated into the broader culture — not completely, in most cases, but significantly and substantially in most cases. That means they are constantly exposed to the culture, and that culture is thoroughly feminist. So it stands to reason that this would penetrate the American Islamic culture after a generation or two — after all they are not ardent separatists like the Amish. If you are not completely segregated from the culture, you will have certain feminism in your life — whether you like that or not, really.

Also, I’ve read that the Republican Party was determined to prevent any spread of slavery, and many Southern leaders had threatened secession if Lincoln won the 1860 election.

That sounds like it might have been about slavery.

It was about secession; you said so yourself. Secession was considered a right by many of the Founders, so if a state wants to secede in order to preserve slavery, enforced existentialism, or crossdressing, it’s no one’s business but the state in question. As Brad stated, Lincoln didn’t give a damn about slaves, but he was willing to use them as props to turn his war of aggression into a holy crusade.

If you’re for giving the federal government the power to invade sovereign states in order to prevent what was widely considered a right, you shouldn’t mind anything the feds do today. Do you think men would be worse off if Saint Lincoln hadn’t destroyed the republic?

It’s because of the overall culture. That is dominant and influences everything. The only groups who are effective at keeping that at bay are the ones who work hard at being devotedly separatist — e.g., the Amish, the Chasidim, etc. Most American muslims live in a way that is in many ways integrated into the broader culture — not completely, in most cases, but significantly and substantially in most cases. That means they are constantly exposed to the culture, and that culture is thoroughly feminist.

The brother of a friend of ours used family contacts back in Pakistan to try to find a wife. He has a STEM PHD and is very successful, but can’t find a suitable wife to import to the US. All of the women start by informing him that they won’t cook, need an outrageous budget for clothes shopping, etc. As it was explained to us, the “Real Housewives” franchise is very popular in Pakistan, and the lifestyle they see on reality TV is what Pakistani women expect if they come to the US.

At the risk of igniting a flame war, I would also add that Muslim culture is very misunderstood by the west. There is a widespread assumption for example that Muslim men are more manly than Christian men. While there are manly Muslim men, the assumption isn’t true as a rule. I suspect much of this comes from the fact that they are raised almost exclusively by their mothers, and a strong cultural taboo against manual labor (getting their hands dirty).

I know very little from personal experience about the Islam. But someone I know well lived in UAE for two years. He said the image of men as dominating the family in Islam is totally incorrect. He said in the house, the women rule with an iron fist.

I say again, in the house.

It looks like men rule because if she starts screwing up outside the house, bad things happen to her. Fornication; adultery; etc. She can literally lose her head in some governments.s

But, Muslim men told him she can even tell her husband to GTFO of the house and the leaders will make him go.

In the USA, of course, women rule both inside and outside the house. So, to us, when bad things can happen to Muslim women, for example, for sexual misconduct, it seems as if they are not in charge. But, they are.

I have read that the cry from the north was “for the union” not “to free the slaves”. I was indoctrinated our lovely government school system for many years, but I learned some things in spite of that.

JDG,

I did not mean to claim you were claiming the war was correct. Your very first post I replied to implied the normal idea that the war was about slavery, a common mistake many have, though that may not have been really what it said.

@mike 11:07 pm: “Women lose their husbands, their fathers, their sons in combat.”
Hmm what about those husbands, fathers and sons..are they secondary victims since they just died?”

Men dying is not the problem. It is ALWAYS in the context of how it affects womyn, or didn’t you get the memo? All the young men refusing to work full time, playing video games, the whole stereotype is NOT a problem until…wait…where are the good provider slaves. Where is my husband? All these men dying mean NOTHING until it MIGHT AFFECT ME. Mememememememememememememeemememememe. You really didn’t get the memo.

> secession was not considered a right by many (or even, really, any) of the Founders

You might want to read up on the arguments made for New England to seceed in the early 1800s. Quite a bit of support for that, although they did not follow through. The writings of the founders also include support for that right as it was a voluntary grouping, with the right to leave. We would not have a country now if they had tried to sell the idea of a Hotel California country when they were voting on ratification of the Constitution.

Again, there is a thread at J4G that goes into this at length. I wrote the OP and then many comments. There are tons of quotes that I cited to support my position.

Since D hasn’t yet ruled this OT and out of bounds, I will say a couple of things. First, the Articles of Confederation, in their very title, speak of “Perpetual Union” so the idea that no one would have signed on had they understood the purpose was perpetual is not tenable. Second, someone asked whether I support “secession.” If it is done mutually and Constitutioanlly, then yes, I would say it can be lawful (a seperate question from whether it is right or just or prudent). But when it is done unilaterally against the will of other parties to the contract, then no. In that case it is no different from anarchy: I lost this or that vote so I quit. No government is possible on that basis. Unilateral secession is the political analogue to no-fault divorce.

“”If Judaism is patriarchal why does it sound like you are describing a matriarchy? Was the patriarchy a facade all along or did it fall?””

A lot of Jewish households are a matriarchy,make no mistake.These are the “high powered” Jew broads that want to run everything. Most of the Jewish households I know the MAN runs the show.Like mine as an example.My mother would always try to “over rule ” my father.He would then put her in her place.She still tries to do this today.One thing that has always made me laugh about Jewish women.You see these beautiful Jewish women(JAP’s as you Americans refer to them) with the most butt ugly guy you could imagine.You wonder to yourself “WTF”???…..Very easy to sum up…….MONEY!

The thread that you bring up in every comment but won’t link to is irrelevant if you’re unwilling to make the same points here.

Sobran addresses “perpetual union” here: tinyurl.com/lnah2hw

The Constitution itself is silent on the subject, but since secession was an established right, it didn’t have to be reaffirmed. More telling still, even the bitterest opponents of the Constitution never accused it of denying the right of secession. Three states ratified the Constitution with the provision that they could later secede if they chose; the other ten states accepted this condition as valid.

We can now put paid to “none of the founders thought secession was a right” and probably most of your ghost thread besides.

Second, someone asked whether I support “secession.” If it is done mutually and Constitutioanlly, then yes, I would say it can be lawful (a seperate question from whether it is right or just or prudent).

No, the question was whether or not you believe secession is a right, and you do not. Your parameters for “legal” secession are ludicrous, since nations and empires do not just give up territory and a tax base without a fight. Not to worry, though: statism is very fashionable at the moment. The very regime that enforces no-fault divorce depends on it.

Really?……The Catholic women that I know,and have dated,were no where near as controlling and manipulative as Jewish women.One thing that I used to do when I was between the ages of 17 & 23 was to bring home a Catholic girl.When my mother saw that gold crucifix around her neck she would be horrified.I use to love doing that……L*

@Opus

“”I had a Jewish Girlfriend – probably one of his rejects – but she was not an atheist even though she worked for Planned Parenthood””

Really?……not an atheist?….and she worked at an abortion mill?……

“”I think what she really wanted was a nice Jewish boy, but it seems that no Jewish man wanted her””

This seems to be way.Myself and other Jewish colleagues would never get involved with Jewish women.

Don’t all men always have the option of celibacy? At least Christian and Atheist men do. I’m not so sure about Jewish, Islamic, or Hindu men. I think Buddhism encourages it also.

Faithful Mormon men do not have this option. The believers are enjoined to marry and have as many children as possible. In fact, staying single and/or celibate is considered a rather grievous sin in Mormonism (only for men… women are excused).

Being unmarried excludes Mormon men from any form of leadership, and unmarried men are considered to be children under the dominion of their fathers until they finally get hitched. The believers feel that celibacy ends their opportunity for the greatest rewards in the Mormon afterlife also.

There was a BBC news report from a refugee camp for Syrians, and the reporter made the same point – most of the people there were women and children, and that’s because women are always the primary victims of war.

It had not entered the reporter’s tiny mind that the men were absent because they had been forced to stay behind, in order to kill and die for whichever bully was in charge of the place where they lived. That the refugee camp was a relatively safe place, and that’s why she could go there with her bodyguards, whereas it would be suicidal for her to visit the front line where the men were.

I’m kind of new here, so correct me if I’m going up a wrong route, but I don’t know a single TradCon that would disagree with the above statement.

The issue is that “tradcons” are quite feminist, apart from abortion. Pretty much everything else is endorsed, openly or tacitly, in how they raise their daughters to be. The script of college –> grad school –> career building –> travel/experience –> marry around 27-32 … is endorsed as a practical matter by the overwhelming majority of tradcons when it comes to their daughters. That script is 100% feminist. It is about empowering their daughters to be strong and independent, downplaying the marital/mother/wife role until later (which obviously subordinates it) and tacitly accepting that sex is happening outside of marriage (any tradcon who thinks his attractive daughter is going to remain celibate until 30 in this culture while she is here, there and everywhere advancing her career and gaining life experience and so on is obviously sticking their head in the sand).

They decry feminism as a label and would resist the idea that they are feminists. But in reality when it comes to their own daughters, nearly all of them are de facto feminists. And the stuff they don’t like, they just pretend isn’t happening (like sex and, in some cases, abortion).

Don’t have time to read the above comments, so someone probably already said this, but… feminism is definitely ugly… because its built upon all the opposite virtues and goodness we as humans are supposed to WORK to develop in ourselves. The natural state of people, men and women, is ugly… we have to work to be beyond that – its why the Christian life is SO hard… because it is a lot of work to go against what is normal.

But you could say that about anything that takes work… “its a lot of work to clean my house, so I’m just going to let it naturally get filthier and filthier until we get sick physically and psychologically from it (yuck!).” “Its a lot of work to stay beautiful and in shape, so I’m just going to NOT take care of my face and skincare, and NOT workout anymore because its just.. so … hard, and takes SO much effort.”

LOL people who don’t make these excuses are beyond happier in life. Unhappiness and discontentment (what feminism is founded on) is about having an unhealthy victim mentality – paired together with a strong aversion to doing the hard work and putting in the effort to create a beautiful life, no matter your circumstances. Its the opposite of being a light, a joyful beautiful person.

Its the opposite of gratitude for the gifts given to you in your life… which of course, is very ugly when you really think about it.

Its the opposite of taking ownership for your life and choices (again, falling into a victim mentality).
Thank you Dalrock, for posting these things!!!

“”Little did she know she’s made herself more attractive to the comicon nerds””

That is what I think also.She is going to get more stares,comments etc. from men now than she ever has…..and I am pretty sure that is what she wants.She will enjoy getting all the attention that comes with being a circus side show freak.

@JamesK

Thanks for the link.I have read that article a few years back.Very good read.I am also very familiar with Mr. Makow as he is Canadian,as well as a University of Toronto grad as I am.

The Civil War was largely about slavery – the slavery debate escalated into war. The South wanted not only to keep their slaves, but to expand slavery, i.e. burning Kansas.

Lincoln said the “to keep the union” thing, but he was clearly on the anti-slavery side. Clearly, if he could ALSO have gotten rid of slavery, he would have, as ended up happening in real life. The quote just highlights that in the American political/cultural system the Union was first priority. That doesn’t mean the second issue (slavery) didn’t matter or that anybody saying something like that didn’t care about it.

Edwin, I am guessing you are going off the speeches, not the actions, of Lincoln and others. Doing that for Bill Clinton (or likely many recent presidents) would give a much different picture of what they did and intended.

The only joke says, “How do you know if a politician is lying? When he moves his lips!” for a reason.

Look at the core issues.

Escoffer, I have read far to much to be swayed by a single blog post. I am no longer in the cult of Lincoln and I see things far differently. You may want to take that red pill too.

I do see a relation of this to modern marriage. We let men get/be divorced, but we don’t remove their rights to separation, we require ongoing payments to be made to the other party in most cases.

The North got their payments and then some. Including boondoggles and such. It is not surprising that Grant’s administration was known as the most corrupt in our history: Lincoln’s set things up for that!

I would note that I have been told I am related to Lincoln as well. I am no longer proud of that fact as I have studied a bit more about him, not the pablum I was taught in school.

I am wondering whether there may be a correlation between the popularity of marriage and the age at which women marry. After WW2 there was a pent-up demand for marriage (followed by a baby-boom) and by 1970 the average age of marriage had for a woman fallen to just twenty years of age. As the number of children born has decreased, marriage has become less-popular and the average age of marriage has increased for a woman to nearly thirty.

There may of course be many other factors at play but perhaps there is not a correlation but a causation.

I’m kind of unclear whether Ann was meaning “you” as in you specifically, Dalrock or whether she was simply saying “you” generically, meaning anyone who satisfied the condition of her statement that “when you hate women because of Sanger and her followers, you feel OK hurting women (since they are all evil). You have then become the thing you hate. Sadly, you hurt women, who may then become more attracted to Sanger and her ilk.”

I think the point Ann seems to be missing or at least not fully addressing is that yes, men and women can both be evil but that when men cheat and divorce their wives, society says (understandably) that they’re just useless pigs. When women do the same, feminism encourages society to have the “You go, girl! You deserve to be happy!” attitude. Can we honestly say that society would have the same “You go!” attitude for a man? Since Ann’s not a feminist, according to her, I hope she doesn’t share this ridiculous double-standard, but it’s hard to deny that society often does, thanks in large (whole?) part to feminism.

Additionally, she stated “…that having a bad experience, or 4, does not entitle you to paint a whole group of people a certain way, especially when they do not choose to be a part of a group. I am not talking about people who join a terrorist group, or a feminist group or any other voluntary group.” This is a reasonable point, but to whom is it directed? I don’t believe this blog is concerned with painting women a certain way but is in fact concerned with the ones who do identify as part of a “feminist group,” even if only in philosophy when they call themselves “feminists.” “Feminism” is a negative word in spite of people’s attempts to say that it’s just about equality. If I wanted to call racial equality “blackism” or “whiteism” would that really sound like it was just about equality?

“Feminism” is a negative word in spite of people’s attempts to say that it’s just about equality.

Even if feminism really was about equality it would still be just another con job, only with a pretty mask. The real world does not recognize equality (as the term is usually employed) for men or women, and certainly not between men and women. The Bible doesn’t speak of equality like that either, though it does speak of justice and mercy. I’ve reached the conclusion that in order to have justice and mercy, a society can not have equality between the sexes.

Well, of course, there are different kinds of equality, whether you’re talking about equal rights under the law or just equal value as human beings. The problem is that feminists don’t actually advocate for either one.

Under the law, at least in the US, some people are wanting special rights like with this proposed “equal pay for women” legislation. That’s not an equal opportunity bill. That’s an equal outcome bill. Women already have the right to seek the same pay rates as men do.

Likewise, women already have the same intrinsic value as human beings as men do, which isn’t lessened simply by having different roles in life.

Escoffer, I have read far to much to be swayed by a single blog post. I am no longer in the cult of Lincoln and I see things far differently. You may want to take that red pill too.

Agreeing with Lincoln does not make me a cult member. You say to evaluate the man on his actions, agreed.

” If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone I would also do that.”

Resupplying Fort Sumter instead of surrendering it – preserving the Union. Prosecuting the war after shots were fired – preserving the Union. Emancipating only the slaves in the rebelling states – preserving the Union. Planning to welcome the rebelling states back into the Union without punitive measures – preserving the Union.

The Union is more worthwhile than slavery, the issue that drove the split of the Union. That the Progressives and Democrats (and Republicans) have corrupted the Union into a welfare nanny state is a separate matter and crisis.

Antagonize the Confederacy by maintaining a fort in the mouth of one of the South’s most important harbors – “preserving the Union.”

Prosecuting the war after shots were fired – preserving the Union.

Provoking the South into war for the sake of a tariff system and federal power – “preserving the Union.”

When Seward told Lincoln to let the South go, the president’s reply was “But what will become of my tariff?”

The Union is more worthwhile than slavery, the issue that drove the split of the Union. That the Progressives and Democrats (and Republicans) have corrupted the Union into a welfare nanny state is a separate matter and crisis.

That was almost a nice dodge, especially how you set the right of secession aside like its beyond the pale. Lincoln’s federal overreach – and that’s putting it extremely mildly – set the precedent for all overreach that came after, including misandrist laws. If the federal government can send its armed forces to invade a part of its own country, it can do anything it likes. The states are now little more than provinces ruled by D.C., and that’s a direct consequence of Lincoln’s aggression. It’s calumny for Lincoln-worshipers and anti-secessionists to pretend they don’t own the current federal apparatus. You got what you wanted.

It is true that the Constitution is itself silent on the issue of secession. But by what principle must silence be interpreted to be assent or support?

The Constitution is silent on secession because the question was already considered settled. The Constitutional Convention was called in order to fix problems with the Articles of Confederation, which declare the Union to be perpetual, and yet were considered to be too weak to function effectively. It would be strange, to say the least, that a document which was called for and expressly drafted in order to create a stronger federal government should at the very same moment be interpreted to allow secession, the greatest possible abrogation of federal power.

When I say that the founders did not believe in the justice of secession, I obviously do not mean every single political actor alive at the time. There was a strong anti-federalist contingent, which advocated strongly against the Constitution. Some of them didn’t want any kind of union at all. Some of them wanted a very loose union which was enterable and exitable at will. They had their say and they lost the argument. Notable, too, that back then these differences weren’t primarily sectional. Anti-federalists had adherents all over, just not in positions of great influence. In fact, the leading figures of North and South by and large wanted the union, which is why the necessary compromises were able to be made to keep North and South together in 1787-9.

The leading founders—Washington, Jefferson, Adams, Franklin, Madison, Hamilton Morris, Lee, Jay and many others—all were quite clear about secession. (Note that this list and the broader cohort comprise a good mix of North and South.) Many of them spoke out in the topic in later years as secessionist sentiment popped up. The record is clear on this.

What they all knew—which the modern right for some reason has trouble with—is that secession contains within itself the seeds of its own destruction. We are not talking about the amicable parting of the Czech Republic and Slovakia here. Those were two nations of quite different peoples forced together against their will and who left each other on mutually agreed terms. “I lost so I quit” is not at all the same thing. No government is possible on that basis.

No, I don’t believe secession is a “right.” There is no morally coherent concept of “rights” in which rights inhere in or attach to supra-human institutions as opposed to individual human beings. Neither states nor counties nor any other political boundary-unit have “rights.” Only people have rights. That is the political theory on which the American Founding is based, and on which all of modern democracy is based, however corrupted and misunderstood it may be in our time. The whole concept of “rights” (as opposed to “right”) is a modern invention, or discovery, in any case. To find a coherent principle of right (not “rights”) or justice that inheres in a nation or a people, as distinct from individuals, one must have recourse to pre-modern thought.

All this said, I have been noticing over the last 10 or 20 years a rising hostility on the right to Lincoln. It seems completely dominant on the alt-right blogosphere, to the point that it is universally taken for granted that Lincoln is the source of all left-wing mischief in America. I’ve explained elsewhere at length why I believe this is not so, and I could say it all again if anyone cares.

But for the moment, I’d rather speculate on why this has happened. Again, speculation, nothing more. Some of it may have to do with an assumption that anyone who admires Lincoln or thinks he was right (about anything) must hate the South. Well, in my case, that is certainly not so. I could go on at length, including using such tropes as “Some of my best friends are Southerners” (which would be true) and that some of the writers and intellectuals I most admire are Southern (also true). Instead I will just point out that from the point of view of contemporary political practice and patriotism, the South is much, much less corrupt than the North or than my beloved West Coast. Without the South, America would be a much greater mess than it is today. It’s also ironic that South is the most patriotic section of the country today by far, pledging un-ironic allegiance to the “United States of America”, i.e., the very country and Union that Lincoln saved. In that sense, and in others, the South’s actual sentiment and practice I find to be more sensible and admirable than both the smugness of Northern/coastal liberalism and the incoherence of Lincoln’s modern right-wing opponents.

Second, I think it is safe to say that there is a general sense in the alt-right blogosphere that the current trajectory of America or even of the whole West is untenable. I generally agree with this. I make no predictions about what may come or when, but some form of “ending” seems inevitable and sooner rather than later. Whether that takes the form of outright collapse, or breakup I could not say. In any event, I sense that there is a general uneasiness about Lincoln as setting a precedent against secession in the future for when the federal government and the coastal oligarchs who run it finally become too unbearable for the broad mass of the core of the historic American nation. In other words, certain people wish to be able to assert a “right” of secession in the face of an overweening tyranny that they see coming.

But such an assertion is not necessary. The right of revolution is a fundamental human right, as asserted and explained in the Declaration of Independence. It may seem to some like hair-splitting—revolution v. secession—but it’s not, for reasons I explained in the other thread. When and if the justification for revolution finally comes, Lincoln’s ideas won’t be there standing in the way. Oh, sure, they will be used by the people in power as cover to justify whatever they want to do. But no government ever willingly consents to its own demise through revolution. They all fight to keep what they have and they will say anything to “justify” so doing.

It is nonetheless important for all of us to get the theory right. As Nova said long ago on his own blog, it’s vital to get the first principles right. Everything flows from that. If you begin from error, the errors just compound.

It was a fort now in foreign territory. How is restocking it a good thing? Seems like a hostile action to me.

Regardless if it was “foreign” territory or not, the Union still had legit claim to the fort, seeing how it was federal property pre-secession.

The alternative to restocking the fort is to allow it to run out of supplies, followed by a surrender of the location and/or the garrison. Surrendering the Union’s property claims in the face of hostility is surrender. While that is in the South’s interests, that does not advance the cause of “Preserving the Union”.

Was it provocative? Yes. (but so is the act of secession *after* losing an election) Was it in the interests of preserving the Union? Yes.

Provoking the South into war for the sake of a tariff system and federal power – “preserving the Union.”

Nice try at reframe, but secession was based on preserving the expansion of slavery, in the aftermath of losing an election, before Lincoln ever received political power. Per Escoffier’s post, this was during a time with the lowest tariffs in American history, and tariffs were barely mentioned by any of the seceding states. How something can be considered so central to their motivations for secession that it’s not even mentioned is a mystery for the ages.

“Provoking the South into war” is the South firing the first shots. If you wish to deprive the South of their agency for that action, then let’s put it this way – if the South is too hotheaded to not fire shots when it’s not in their interests, they’ve thrown away their right to run their own country.

That was almost a nice dodge, especially how you set the right of secession aside like its beyond the pale.

The “right to secession” does not grant you the right to demand peaceful recognition by injured parties. The British were well within their rights to put down the American Revolution – and the Founders recognized that when they pledged their lives and wealth to that cause. For some reason, this second revolution is supposed to be let go peacefully even when they fire the first shots.

NB: Their “lives,” their wealth (“fortunes,” actually, but same thing) and–this is important–their “sacred honor.” Not just their honor, but their sacred honor.

The whole question of the Revolution comes down to the justice of the Founders’ case. They might well have lost, even in a just cause. The alternative is, there are no just causes, there are only success and failure. “Truly it is a very natural and ordinary thing to desire to acquire. And when men do it who can, they will be praised or not blamed; but when they cannot, and wish to do it anyway, here lie the error and the blame.” (Prince 3).

The anti-Lincolnites want to have it both ways. Lincoln’s actions and the war itself are held to be unjust. But the ground on which free government rests is held to be chimerical, just the cynical assertion of power by the stronger party. On the one hand secesion is just and its prevention is unjust, but on the other hand, there is no just basis for government and theory of the Revolution is either denied to have been asserted at all or held to be false.

I arrange the bills in my wallet in order of face value. First $1 bills, then $5 bills, then $10 bills, etc. I carry $5 bills (Lincoln) and $50 bills (Grant) upside-down. If we still had large bills and I ever had reason to carry one in my wallet, I would do the same for $10,000 bills (Salmon P. Chase), and $100,000 bills (Woodrow Wilson).

Faithful Mormon men do not have this option. The believers are enjoined to marry and have as many children as possible. In fact, staying single and/or celibate is considered a rather grievous sin in Mormonism (only for men… women are excused).

Being unmarried excludes Mormon men from any form of leadership, and unmarried men are considered to be children under the dominion of their fathers until they finally get hitched. The believers feel that celibacy ends their opportunity for the greatest rewards in the Mormon afterlife also.

Boxer

Thanks for that Boxer. Given their view of the afterlife, I can understand their wanting men to have at least one wife to start off with… though I’m curious as to why this is considered a sin for men, but not considered a sin for women.

It’s more than a little perverse that you don’t see the irony in this statement. Lincolnites have been attempting a reframe since 1865, and they’ve been wildly successful. Funny that a great many historical figures, from Charles Dickens to Lord Acton, saw the justice in the Confederacy’s actions without regard to the slavery issue. The propagandists have no excuse.

Per Escoffier’s post, this was during a time with the lowest tariffs in American history

They were so low that Lincoln refused to let the South go if it meant losing the tariff. Take it up with him.

“Provoking the South into war” is the South firing the first shots.

And nothing to do with Lincoln mobilizing some 80,000 troops with which to invade the South. If your own inkling is to sit and watch your country be surrounded for fear of losing the propaganda war later on, I pity your blood. But again, your ilk is probably in the majority in 2014.

The “right to secession” does not grant you the right to demand peaceful recognition by injured parties.

Jefferson disagreed: “If there be any among us who would wish to dissolve this Union or to change its republican form, let them stand undisturbed as monuments of the safety with which error of opinion may be tolerated where reason is left to combat it.” — from the inaugural address in 1801.

“Whether we remain in one confederacy, or form into Atlantic and Mississippi confederacies, believe not very important to the happiness of either part.” — from a letter to Joseph Priestly written in 1804

So you oppose the right of secession and are therefore at odds with some of the founding principles of the country, as was noted earlier. Will you now make the argument for the colonies staying in Britain’s union, or will you throw out another unprincipled exception?

Regardless if it was “foreign” territory or not, the Union still had legit claim to the fort, seeing how it was federal property pre-secession.

LOL, so let me get this straight. The federal government gets to plant foreign military outposts in each state, and you think these allow the federals a permanent end run around state sovereignty? States’ rights are impossible under such a scenario, but as you’ve already chosen which side of history you wish to be on, I’m sure you’ve provided yourself a rationalization for this too.

I disagree with Boxer that being single is a serious sin in the Mormon faith for men or women. If you have opportunities to marry and you refuse them for selfish hypergamic reasons or selfish male reasons than it is some sin of omission. The Mormon faith is very clear that marriage is the correct path in this life, but it does not work out for everyone. The blame falls more on a man on the assumption that they are more able to be the aggressor in pursuing a mate. That is probably changing.

The whole question of the Revolution comes down to the justice of the Founders’ case.

You’ve twisted yourself into quite a knot there, kiddo. It’s a convoluted (to to say dishonest) argument indeed which justifies Colonial secession while condemning that of the Confederacy, especially since the principle was no different in either case. Besides, believing that it should be somehow up to you to determine when a secession is just or not – and, if a secession is found wanting by you, presumably justifying a full-on military invasion – is simply reserving the right to become a tyrant and undermines the concepts of rights and sovereignty. That would have been the loyalist position during the war.

Own up to what you are. If secession is anarchy, then anarchy is the heritage of every American.

The Gettysburg speech was at once the shortest and the most famous oration in American history…the highest emotion reduced to a few poetical phrases. Lincoln himself never even remotely approached it. It is genuinely stupendous. But let us not forget that it is poetry, not logic; beauty, not sense. Think of the argument in it. Put it into the cold words of everyday. The doctrine is simply this: that the Union soldiers who died at Gettysburg sacrificed their lives to the cause of self-determination — that government of the people, by the people, for the people, should not perish from the earth. It is difficult to imagine anything more untrue. The Union soldiers in the battle actually fought against self-determination; it was the Confederates who fought for the right of their people to govern themselves.

As I said, and as all the Founders acknowledged (even the anti-Federalists), there is and must be a natural right of revolution, if the concept of “rights” is to have any coherence. The just exercise of that right depends on the justice of the cause, which is the flipside of the injustice of the regime against which revolution is invoked. Even today, this is debated in the American case. For instance, Novaseeker—whom I respect a great deal—has said that he thinks the American Revolution was likely an overreaction against not all that terrible British behavior. I disagree, but it is a reasonable case to make. It is in any case a prudential question, not one that can be settled definitively by recourse to any facts or ironclad principle.

There is no comparable “right of secession.” All rights, again, inhere in individual people, not in “states” or any other administrative creation of man. It’s notable that the South did not invoke the natural right of revolution invoked by the founders—not one Southern state did in its secession resolution, nor did any Southern statesman in an speech or letter. Nor did Calhoun, the deepest thinker of all the Southern statesmen before the war. The reason they did not was because they knew that to invoke the right of revolution was to invoke the natural rights of human beings, which is incompatible with the practice of slavery, which is the institution they were fighting to defend.

So, no, the principles of 1860-1 were not the same as those of 1776—something on which the actors at the time were quite clear.

Secession IS anarchy. Revolution CAN LEAD to anarchy but is not identical with it. The American Revolution did not lead to anarchy. It’s far more likely, in any case, that a bad revolution will lead not to anarchy but to tyranny, as in the French and Russian cases.

If the South had a case to make that the federal government had become so overweening that revolution was justified, they should have made it. They didn’t. The federal government had done nothing to them except elect Lincoln, who swore that he would not interfere with slavery in those states where it existed. Secession (in seven cases) happened before Lincoln was even sworn in. And, as noted elsewhere, the South had enjoyed a great run of wins over the prior decade, whose highlights included the repeal of the Missouri Compromise, the Kansas Nebraska Act, and the Dredd Scott decision. So what “tyranny” was the federal government imposing that justified revolution? A revolution which, again, the South did not even assert or invoke.

As an aside, it is surely odd how the anti-Lincolnites in one breath denounce him as an ideological crusader, then proceed to speculate that how despite his pledge to respect slavery in the south he intended to interfere anyway (i.e., they claim he was lying), but then in the next breath call him a hypocrite for NOT interfering with slavery in the South and say that this proves that the war was not about slavery. As if these same people would CREDIT Lincoln had he interfered with slavery in the South, against his pledge.

The truth is, it bolsters Lincoln’s case to acknowledge that he did not interfere with slavery in the South. Lincoln said he wouldn’t, and he didn’t. His reasoning was that he had no Constitutional power to do so. And this makes him a tyrant? It makes him the very opposite of a tyrant. He respected Constitutional limits to his own power.

Once one acknowledges that Lincoln did not intend to, and did not in fact, interfere with slavery in the South, the game is pretty much given away. What then justified secession? Nothing but preference or will. That is the principle of secession: any state, any county, any city, and borough, any town, any village—and why stop there?—any family, any person may “secede” at any time for any reason. “Self-determination” somehow demands that. On that basis, government is impossible. To say nothing of the fact that “self-determination” points to natural rights, which as noted, are incompatible with the idea of secession. There can be no government based on rights that is not actualized through a social contract, and there can be no social contract if it is exitable by any party, at any time, for any reason, without the other party’s (or parties’) consent.

Mencken is a very amusing man whom I have enjoyed reading from time to time, but his understanding of political philosophy is poor.

It’s more than a little perverse that you don’t see the irony in this statement. Lincolnites have been attempting a reframe since 1865, and they’ve been wildly successful. Funny that a great many historical figures, from Charles Dickens to Lord Acton, saw the justice in the Confederacy’s actions without regard to the slavery issue. The propagandists have no excuse.

Yes, we each think the other is trying to reframe. The difference is that my position is better backed by historical facts.

Why the silence on tariffs if that was the primary motivation for secession? Why did a decrease in the overall level of tariffs increase the South’s desire to secede? Your appeal to the fact that “historical” figures backed the South doesn’t add anything to the discussion if you will not discuss their rationale. This isn’t a popularity contest, it’s about what is correct and true.

They were so low that Lincoln refused to let the South go if it meant losing the tariff. Take it up with him.

You have not established that Lincoln was primarily motivated by tariff revenue. Show some substance.

And nothing to do with Lincoln mobilizing some 80,000 troops with which to invade the South. If your own inkling is to sit and watch your country be surrounded for fear of losing the propaganda war later on, I pity your blood. But again, your ilk is probably in the majority in 2014.

If the South’s first shots were against an 80,000 strong invading Federal army, they would have a claim to “self-defense”. But that did not happen. The South fired first shots against a federal fort that was outside a Southern city due to the circumstances of the secession. If in fact the South had the right of secession and was its own separate country at this point, this is an aggressive act of war against its new neighbor.

Jefferson disagreed: “If there be any among us who would wish to dissolve this Union or to change its republican form, let them stand undisturbed as monuments of the safety with which error of opinion may be tolerated where reason is left to combat it.” — from the inaugural address in 1801.

Comprehension failure. Jefferson was not speaking of people who had seceded from the Union. He was speaking of the losers of the presidential election, and those who generally disapproved of the Constitutional government. He is protecting freedom of speech and thought, not the right to have secession peacefully recognized. There is no such right at all.

Again, American revolution was fought with guns and men bled for the right of the colonies to escape British sovereignty. The South could expect no less.

So you oppose the right of secession and are therefore at odds with some of the founding principles of the country, as was noted earlier. Will you now make the argument for the colonies staying in Britain’s union, or will you throw out another unprincipled exception?

The only “right of secession” is your right to declare independence. It’s then up to you to keep it in the face of opposing claims. Failure to keep it indicates you have no business being independent.

If the American revolution failed and all the Founding Fathers were hung until dead, that would be well within the rights of the Britain as the sovereign of the colonies.

You seem to have this strange notion that mere assertion entitles you to something. You exclaim, “I want independence”, and all other people are to bow at your feet and follow your will. Where else does this wishful thinking work? “I want a lot of money!”, “I want a hot woman at my beck and call!”

LOL, so let me get this straight. The federal government gets to plant foreign military outposts in each state, and you think these allow the federals a permanent end run around state sovereignty? States’ rights are impossible under such a scenario, but as you’ve already chosen which side of history you wish to be on, I’m sure you’ve provided yourself a rationalization for this too.

Those forts were built with the consent of each of the states while they were MEMBERS of the Union. They are not “foreign military outposts” when they were built. That they could be considered “foreign” by the South is because the South seceded AFTER they were built and garrisoned.

The forts and the federal soldiers had a right to continue being there until an agreement was negotiated on who should now own the fort, and what concessions each side should make.

The South decided to negotiate with guns. This is called “War”. It was a bad idea, but either the South is responsible for making bad decisions, or the South does not have the responsibility to be its own country. Since you’re arguing against the latter, you really ought to accept the former.

Dalrock –
I’m just seeing this – so, ehm – thanks for citing me I appreciate that even if in (apparent disagreement).
Actually I’m just catching up on Dalrock – I wish sometimes I was more regular here but that isn’t meant to be – other projects man, can’t always be commenting on someone’s (admittedly pretty awesome – even if I often disagree) blog.
Anyway – I will not argue with you that Sanger was a radical feminist.

I do maintain that viewing the situation you describe through a class prism is explanatory without reference to feminist considerations. That is so because – as my post asserted – reverse the genders but keep the scenario constant and the same envy is likely to come through.
The class prism helps to show that it’s a “humaned” issue, not a “gendered” one.

Emphasizing Sanger’s feminism muddies the waters IMO. Starts to seem like we are framing. Let’s combat that by expanding the frame not closing it. The left – ironically – does the same thing – it frames class out of the picture – then it doesn’t need to deal with the fact that 55% of the poor are white households (US Census Table 696). That doesn’t play well with the ascendant Identity Politics narrative on which the present electable majorities or pluralities of the left are (regrettably) based.

Friedan … it’s funny you bring her up Dalrock. I’ve been planning an article specifically addressing some aspects of how you analyze things and my intent has been to lead the article with a table that lays a quote from Friedan side-by-side with a quote by you.

Personally – the Matt Taylor affair may have exhausted the personal energies I sometimes call on to put a defense up for feminism (another topic for an article, another time). Just like some quotes from Paul Elam – in context – take things to a place of “wow, I just can’t defend that”, the Matt Taylor affair was so over the top that I lose my appetite for it. All the best of humanism and all the best of Kant can’t inspire me to defend this.

Having said that – weakened appetite or not – there is what I believe and this is it: all “feminism” isn’t the feminism you so feverishly and effectively critique on this blog. The ascendant feminism of today is a form of opportunism that amounts to the ugly wages of identity politics. Politics will do that to a movement.

I don’t believe Friedan was party to that – I think she even opposed it and its rise in her lifetime. Her death in 2006 in some ways cleared the way for what we have today. Friedan was a humanist and wanted for men what she wanted for women: autonomy. That is a humanism and a feminism that shouldn’t be spared critique, but it isn’t the adversary you clash swords with here.

Oh – and I still don’t really agree with your use of “solipsism”. Keep it up though – iron sharpening iron.